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Dessert

Huckleberry Tea-cake

A baked cake made with huckleberries, flour, eggs, butter, sugar, spices, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Huckleberry Tea-cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.

  3. Beat in the egg yolks one at a time, then add the milk.

  4. Mix in the spices and flour alternately with the whipped egg whites.

  5. Dredge the huckleberries in a little flour and fold them into the batter.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into well-greased muffin tins or two small loaf pans.

  2. Bake until golden brown, about 25-30 minutes.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Cinnamon + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Egg yolks enrich the batter, while whipped whites add lift and structure to the crumb.
All-purpose flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake together as it sets in the oven.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking, helping the cake rise and become light.
Butter
Creamed with sugar to trap air and add richness and a tender texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and, creamed with butter, helps create a light, fluffy batter.
Huckleberries
Add moisture and tart fruit flavor throughout the cake.

The step that matters

Dredge the huckleberries in flour before folding. Light flour coating helps keep the berries suspended in the batter instead of sinking to the bottom during baking, and the dusting helps them distribute evenly.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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